Low Level Grinding (Level 1-50)
I consider level 50 to be pretty much the border before you can start tackling some of the more difficult content, head into the higher level zones, take down the bigger enemies. Until then, you need to earn your wings, grasshopper, and to do that, you need to focus on level in the lower areas and figure out how to get your foot in the door with better gear.
For that, focus on doing several different events AND killing a bunch of enemies in the best grinding locations.
Horde Events are hands down the best events for low level areas, especially as a solo player, because they guarantee legendary items, as well as some quick XP for kills, and finally the big dump of XP for completing them.
With the addition of NPC, there are new ways to grind your levels due to the new locations added, and several of those locations feature a LOT more enemies, and good loot to be collected. Obviously lower level players need lower level enemies to tackle (ESPECIALLY when you’re alone), so I marked off which areas are the best for different level players. All you gotta do is make sure you’ve got either a weapon good enough to tackle these locations by yourself, or get a buddy to carry you. Remember, you NEED to get a hit on the enemy to gain the experience
WV Lumber Co.
This is probably the first area you want to hit as a low level grinding XP. With the Wastelanders update, instead of Super Mutants, you’ll come across a TON of Raiders, which are perfect for Leveling up Fast and grabbing a ton of better weaponry and armor. Make sure you really cover the entire area, as it’s fairly large, and the raiders are spread out across the whole area.
Clancy Manor
This is just east of the Lumber Co., and contains roughly 20 Cultists ripe for the picking. This area can be cleared out a whole lot quick as it’s quite a bit smaller of an place to cover. Make sure to loot the cultists, they can carry a LOT of stimpaks on them, and trust me, as a low level players you’ll want as many as you can carry.
Grafton
This is a hit an miss place, as you need to hope that when you spawn in, so will the enemies. If you’re lucky, you’ll have a TON of super mutants to kill, alongside scorched wandering the area. If you’re even LUCKIER, you’ll encounter a Grafton Monster, who will give quite a bit MORE XP, along with a bunch of good junk. The monster will typically spawn on the west side of town, near the Train station.
Eastern Regional Penitentiary
Alright, listen up. This is NOT your typical grinding area, as you’ve got to cover a couple bases here. First of all, the outside, which is usually crawling with Super Mutants lining not only the walls AROUND the building, so try to keep to cover if you find yourself being sniped, but plenty of mutants wandering the outside field. A good number of low level players said they didn’t like this area due to it’s difficulty with dealing with so many Super Mutants all at once, so tackle the outside yard at your own risk.
Then you’ve got the inside, crawling with Ghouls. This is probably where most of the low level players go, and then just leave the outside until they’re slightly higher level. This isn’t the undermine the interior, as there are also a TON of ghouls that spawn in, and I mean, every cell seems to have one that jumps out at you. I’d suggest a melee weapon for the inside, as there is hardly any room to breathe with a gun, and every enemy is try to smack you.
Charleston Capitol Building
This place can vary in enemy difficulty, so go at your own risk. The town of Charleston is OKAY for XP (takes a while to make your way around the town, time of which could be spent better elsewhere grinding), but the capitol building is COVERED with enemies, inside and out. Start with the inside, as this is where you’ll find an insane amount of enemies, either raiders, super mutants, or ghouls. Make sure you go in prepared, because just like the interior of the penitentiary, you’ll be fighting absolute DROVES of enemies on each floor of the building, sometimes all at once! If you’re lucky, you’ll even get a couple legendary’s spawning on you.
Wade Airport
This is one of the only farm nodes I recommend you take, as it has a pretty good amount of Super Mutants spawning here. They typically hang around both the airplane runway AND the parkade behind the airport building, so quickly killing them up can often give a pretty good amount of XP.
Camden Park
Here’s a good one, especially for players looking for some scorched to kill. Scorched can be easy targets IF you use stealth often, because they’ll often times be found frozen in place before you startle them. You start by clearing out the parking lot, then move into the park and to your left should be another 5-10 of them just sitting there. After you’ve cleaned up the front of the park, head to the interior of the roller coaster, where you’ll probably end up fighting another solid 5-10 of them. Not a TON of enemies, but still decent for just quickly clearing up.
Rollins Labor Camp
This is the first larger Raider settlement you’ll want to tackle. It’s got quite a number of Raiders, varying anywhere from 15-30 or so of them. These guys aren’t always the easiest to kill, especially because they’ll be shooting at your from up high in their fortress, but there’s a ton of cover to hide in. Remember to loot, they drop a lot of good stuff!
South Cutthroat Camp
Here you will find one of the larger Raider encampments, just below the Top of the World. They’re quite spread out around the area, both inside the ski resort building AND outside in a larger (more raider looking) outpost. You can typically find a good 30 or so enemies in this whole area, making it worth cleaning up for all the XP and stimpaks you can get.
High Level Players (Level 50+)
Obviously at this point you know the ropes. You probably have either found or bought some legendary weapons/armor, can kill enemies quickly, and your ready to hit the big leagues. I’m just gonna say it, even at level 50 (I’m talking strictly to first timer level 50’s here), you barely have the perk cards to kill things with max ferocity, so this may be too tough for you still.
This, for me, is MY personal favorite grinding route. It includes a bunch of locations that have not only a TON of enemies to kill for a beautiful amount of XP, but also the chance of Legendary Enemies spawning as well. Each of these locations will feature HIGH LEVEL end game enemies, including Super Mutants, Scorched, Mirelurks, and then some big exotic enemies like Deathclaws, Scorchbeasts, Snallygasters… you get the picture. If you want, I’ll provide a better description of each location and what it includes underneath the grinding map, or you can just head on out and try your luck.
West Tek Research Center
Hands down my favorite place to hit first. Not only does this place include a large quantity of Super Mutants (which give a really high amount of XP, anywhere from 190-400 per kill depending on your buffs), it has a chance to contain upwards of 5 legendary’s (that’s the most I’ve ever seen in there). They won’t always spawn, but hey, it’s always worth it JUST for the insane amount of XP.
Huntersville
Directly underneath West Tek, just down the road, is Huntersville, the next Super Mutant infested grinding location. Here, you (once again) will fight through a solid 15+ Super Mutants with another chance of finding Legendary enemies. Just be wary, as there are a few of them that carry heavy weapons, alongside rifles, and since this is a wide open town, you’re bound to be sniper.
Thunder Mountain Substation TM-02
This Substation is one that guarantees (Unless it’s already been farmed) a high level Deathclaw, either IN the power plant, or very close by. This is great to quickly teleport in, kill the high XP giving enemy, and then head on your merry way. Be careful of the ants though, they can sneak up on you pretty quick.
Sunrise Field
This is another quick area to farm, as it includes anywhere from 5-10 Mirelurks (version varies), 2 or 3 Mirelurk Kings, and a Mirelurk Queen located IN the pond beside the house. You gotta dive in, run around it, and she’ll eventually pop up, scream in frustration, and then you 360 no scope her with a pipe pistol. Just a bunch of quick XP, and OCCASIONALLY the queen can be a legendary.
Overgrown Sundew Valley
Here we have (yet another) quick grinding area. I love this place because TYPICALLY you’ll get a big exotic dude fighting in there, whether is been a sentry bot, a deathclaw, mega sloth, sometimes even a Sheepsquatch (Legendary even!). On top of that, you’ll find a turf war going on between two different types of enemies, so while they’re distracted, you can sneak up and just obliterate all of them. Best part: They’re the HIGH level enemies, meaning you’ll get a hefty amount of XP from farming them off.
By the way, grab the Cranberry’s while you’re there, might as well stock up.
Flooded Trainyard
APPARENTLY this place has a lot of Legendary’s spawning in, and even though I’ve only had a handful spawn with me, it’s still very good for quick XP. Here you will have spawning on you either Snallygasters, Mongrels, Radtoads, or Gulpers. These types of enemies (besides the Mongrels) will give you a pretty good amount of XP, so just do a quick loop around the area.
Crimson Prospect
With the addition of Wastelanders, you now have a GREAT new grinding location of Raiders. These are all high levels NPC, and give a pretty good amount of XP if you kill them all up. It’s a quick run too, containing anywhere from 15-30 enemies, each giving roughly 200 XP depending on your boosts. Sometimes the Raiders can be Legendary, so watch out for those ones!
The Whitespring Golf Club
This is probably the most POPULAR location to farm, just because of the sheer amount of ghouls that spawn. Now, you get a pretty healthy mix of both level 42 enemies (so DECENT XP still), and then you’re level 62 enemies. Basically you just want to head inside the building, make a bit of noise, maybe kill one of two of the ghouls, and then run back to the main entrance door and ready yourself. They will literally hurl dozens of ghouls at you (if you’re lucky) so prepare for an absolute massacre. Bombs, explosive weapons, anything to mow them down quickly is what you want to aim for. Most of the time I can’t even see if there are legendary’s I’m killing, so make sure you scan the meat piles afterwards to check if you got any. Besides that, enjoy the insane amount of XP!
Quick tip, if you’re on your own private server, or server with not many folks who care, nuke this place. You’ll get a ludicrous amount of XP, and the Legendary’s will spawn much more frequently!
The Whitesprings Resort
RIGHT next to the golf club you have the resort, which contains PLENTY of Sentry bots to tackle. If you do a lap around this building, you’ll typically run into about 5 or so of them, each giving nearly a thousand XP per robot, so you might as well quickly destroy them up before moving on to your next location.
The Burrows
I can’t even count how many times I’ve farmed this area for Legendary’s and Experience. It might’ve been one of the lamest so called “dungeons” in all existence, but you gotta give it to em, this is hands down one of the best grinding locations. Ghouls. Everywhere. In every direction you turn. And almost all of them are above max level, so if Legendary’s spawn, you’ll be rolling in them. Simply give the whole place a runabout, rounding them up in herds and clearing them out. In ONE trip of the Burrows along, you can typically level up at LEAST a quarter of a level, if not more.
Hopewell Cave
Finally, you have Hopewell Cave, or what I like to refer as “The Battle of the Titans.” This area has a Deathclaw, Scorchbeast, AND one other random Exotic enemy spawn, any of which could be legendary! By killing all three of these enemies, you gain yourself a solid amount of XP, as well as a ton of loot of killing higher tier characters. The deathclaw is located in the cave right in front of where you spawn in, and once you head in to kill it, the scorchbeast should be spawn and be ready to fight when you exit the cave. Once you kill that beast, head UP the road (south direction) towards the Sons of Dane compound. On the road, there should be a fight going on, where you have the chance to fight a random big exotic enemy there. Tons of XP to be had here!
